Report: Apple buys Cue, a Google Now-esque personal assistant service

The service pulled data from various accounts to offer suggestions.

Anonymous sources are telling several outlets (including AppleInsider and TechCrunch) that Apple has just purchased Cue, a personal assistant service with more than a few similarities to Google Now. News of the acquisition (which, according to various sources, cost Apple somewhere between $35 and $60 million) follows the complete shuttering of the service yesterday.

Cue (once called Greplin) could pull data from a number of services including Gmail, Facebook, and Twitter. It would then organize this data and present you with a unified list of relevant information whenever you opened the app. Android users with Google Now enabled already enjoy similar functionality—Google Now will dynamically track packages or show you the status of flights, for example, based on data it pulls from your configured e-mail accounts. With Apple's purchase of Cue, we would not be surprised to see Siri become capable of the same kinds of tasks in the future (in fact, this was something we asked for in our iOS 7 review).

TechCrunch's Matthew Panzarino posits that the service could also be used to improve the "Today" section of iOS 7's Notification Center. Currently, the feature can show you the weather and a brief summary of your upcoming day based on your calendar appointments, but Cue's ability to reach beyond your calendar for this sort of information could make the feature more appealing.

The bad news for existing Cue users is that the service has completely shut down. Customers who had opted in to the Cue Premium service "will receive a prorated refund" or can request a refund through the iTunes store. All Cue users' data has been deleted rather than transferred.

Whenever I see an acquisition like this, I wonder why the purchaser, in this case Apple, couldn't just develop their own solution? Some of these services are not exactly rocket science.

It tcould be a mix of talent aquicition, intellectual property, contracts, and a well done algorithm. Because believe it or not making a recommendation engine is extremely hard. There is a reason Netflix had a bounty of $1M for a 10% increase in accuracy.

Whenever I see an acquisition like this, I wonder why the purchaser, in this case Apple, couldn't just develop their own solution? Some of these services are not exactly rocket science.

User loyalty. People are always more happy with something that they recognise. In most cases, developing the same thing from scratch will come with its fair share of bugs at the start, and this will confirm the product's assumed inferiority in the minds of the people who already didn't trust it. And this often happens with good reason (ref: origin instead of steam, apple maps instead of google maps). Besides, acquisition is a quick and brutal way to stamp out the competition.

Whenever I see an acquisition like this, I wonder why the purchaser, in this case Apple, couldn't just develop their own solution? Some of these services are not exactly rocket science.

It tcould be a mix of talent aquicition, intellectual property, contracts, and a well done algorithm. Because believe it or not making a recommendation engine is extremely hard. There is a reason Netflix had a bounty of $1M for a 10% increase in accuracy.

telling somebody to work on something is different than having a person with a real passion for the project.would think talent acquisition would be the real catch.

Whenever I see an acquisition like this, I wonder why the purchaser, in this case Apple, couldn't just develop their own solution? Some of these services are not exactly rocket science.

User loyalty. People are always more happy with something that they recognise. In most cases, developing the same thing from scratch will come with its fair share of bugs at the start, and this will confirm the product's assumed inferiority in the minds of the people who already didn't trust it. And this often happens with good reason (ref: origin instead of steam, apple maps instead of google maps). Besides, acquisition is a quick and brutal way to stamp out the competition.

I think Apple just killed any user loyalty by kicking all the existing Cue users to the curb.

Whenever I see an acquisition like this, I wonder why the purchaser, in this case Apple, couldn't just develop their own solution? Some of these services are not exactly rocket science.

User loyalty. People are always more happy with something that they recognise. In most cases, developing the same thing from scratch will come with its fair share of bugs at the start, and this will confirm the product's assumed inferiority in the minds of the people who already didn't trust it. And this often happens with good reason (ref: origin instead of steam, apple maps instead of google maps). Besides, acquisition is a quick and brutal way to stamp out the competition.

I think Apple just killed any user loyalty by kicking all the existing Cue users to the curb.

Yeah. Holy crap, that sucks for Cue users.

This is another one of those things that I hope Apple does soon and does well. I use Google Now on a daily basis, so whie I enjoy the features the limitations are felt - and I'd really love to see someone push Google to improve it.

This is another one of those things that I hope Apple does soon and does well. I use Google Now on a daily basis, so whie I enjoy the features the limitations are felt - and I'd really love to see someone push Google to improve it.

Really? I curious what do you use it for?I'm sure it's more useful in the US, but in Ireland mine just shows the weather forecast and occasionally how long it will take to get home from the place I was half an hour ago.

Really? I curious what do you use it for?I'm sure it's more useful in the US, but in Ireland mine just shows the weather forecast and occasionally how long it will take to get home from the place I was half an hour ago.

Yeah, that's unfortunate. I live in the US, so...

When I'm about to leave work, I check the traffic. In the morning, check the weather. If my wife asks if a package has shipped, I just check Google Now. If I want to see what some of the larger activities are coming up, check Google Now.

Here's one small convenient use of Google Now that should be available widely: navigation. (It worked for me in Italy, anyway)

Whenever you want to navigate to some place, look it up first on your desktop - yknow, with the physical keyboard and mouse and the large display. Ask for directions. Go back to your mobile, open up Google Now. It should have a card about the place you've just searched, with an option to start navigation immediately. It should go without saying, but you probably need search history on, and you need to be logged in on your computer.

If you need to navigate to some place later rather than sooner, add an event to Google Calendar and put the place you need to be in the "Where" field in the event details. As the event time approaches, Google Now should proactively give you a notification when you need to leave to arrive on time, although it might come in too late depending on your network connectivity. You can manually open up Google Now and see the calendar event card, however; that should also have the option to navigate to where you need to be.

Looking backwards the only ones that (to my snobbish eyes) looks trivial are Matcha or Chomp, and even there who knows? They may have been acquired for general data-mining expertise [which I've long stated is Apple's biggest single area of weakness], or for something they'd been working on but not yet released.

Generally I'd say Apple have been stunningly restrained in their acquisitions. I think we're not in a position to say they've been stunningly successful (except in their CPU design acquisitions!) but we know of no obvious disasters, and much of what they've acquired has fairly obviously translated into a product a year or two later (eg Maps, Lala ->iTunes Radio, HDR Photography, Siri).

This is another one of those things that I hope Apple does soon and does well. I use Google Now on a daily basis, so whie I enjoy the features the limitations are felt - and I'd really love to see someone push Google to improve it.

Really? I curious what do you use it for?I'm sure it's more useful in the US, but in Ireland mine just shows the weather forecast and occasionally how long it will take to get home from the place I was half an hour ago.

I'd have to say that's also my experience. It's not clear to me quite why it's so limited.

(a) My mail is ON Google server's, but through Google Apps, not gmail.com (ie personal domain). Google HAS access to it (just like I have access to it through the gmail.com URL) but I have never seen Google do a fancy trick like notice a FedEx tracking number and tell me how the package is doing.

(b) Are they unwilling to ever send push notifications? I've never received a notification from Google Now, but obviously it's a whole lot less useful in terms of "doing things before you know you need them" if it's only communication with us is when you actually open and look at the app.

All it has ever done for me is give local weather (ie just like Apple), and notice eventually where I live and work (but get them backwards, and have bugs in the software so that while I can TELL it which is home and which is work, it reverts back to its backward state after a restart).

Here's one small convenient use of Google Now that should be available widely: navigation. (It worked for me in Italy, anyway)

That sounds great. In Mac OS 10.9 (I just installed the GM) the maps app allows you to send directions to your phone. It's a great service, but I think the passive implementation you describe is really compelling.

Andrew Cunningham / Andrew has a B.A. in Classics from Kenyon College and has over five years of experience in IT. His work has appeared on Charge Shot!!! and AnandTech, and he records a weekly book podcast called Overdue.